Storybook Science - The Swimming Pool

By John McChesney

Once upon a time there was a beautiful underground world complete with
trees, flowers, and hundreds of GLORCHES. For those that have never met
a Glorch before, it is an experience that you would never forget. Glorches
are BIG. They are FAT. But worst of all, Glorches can glorch (burp) with
such power that they can blast a person clear out of sight! In this under-ground
world, the Glorches play an important role: the walls of the cave glow
yellow with light and warmth; the lake provides all the necessary water;
but only the Glorches can provide the clean air needed to keep everything
else alive so far beneath the surface of the earth.

Directly above our beautiful subterranean world, on the earth's surface,
we find the house where Jack and Jill live! It is a very hot day so Jack
and Jill are busy digging their own swimming pool. Day after day they
work from sunrise to sunset. First, Jill (up in the hot sun) pulls the
buckets of dirt up out of the hole with ropes; and Jack deep down in the
cool shade shovels the dirt into the buckets. Then they trade places.

After 10 days of hard labor, Jack and Jill put on their swim suits, hook
a huge hose up to the nearest fire hydrant, and start filling up their
pool. Since the ground is so sandy and the pool so big, it took 5 hours
with the fire hose going full blast to fill the pool. Once their swimming
pool was full, Jill turned off the water and they both dove into the pool
together.

Unfortunately, Jack jumped a little too high, and dove in too deep. When
he hit the bottom, he punched a hole right through the remaining ground.
The next thing Jack knew, he and Jill along with about 2000 tons of water
were falling into the beautiful subterranean world!

When all the Glorches in the cave saw the water falling they all glorched
at the same time in an attempt to blow the water back up out of their
cave. But they were too late, the water was already inside so the pressure
they created just pushed the wet ground back up and sealed the hole closed.

It was very lucky for Jack and Jill that they landed in the lake because
otherwise they would have been flat as a pancake on the hard ground. Once
Jack and Jill regained their senses, they noticed the warm glow of the
walls, the tall green trees, and the many kinds of ducks floating on the
lake. The ducks seemed a bit odd though. They would try to swim underwater
to feed on the bottom but they floated so well that they could only swim
down about 6 inches before they bobbed back to the surface.

When Jack and Jill swam to the beach they came across their first Glorch
which was so angry that it blasted Jack and Jill right back into the middle
of the lake!

"What did you do that for?!" yelled Jill, "We weren't
trying to hurt you!"

"It's not me that I'm worried about," replied the Glorch, "you
have dumped so much water into our lake that it is 3 feet deeper than
before. The poor air-headed ducks can only swim down 6 inches so they
can no longer reach the algae that they used to eat in the shallow water.
Because of you, they are all going to die of starvation!"

If you were Jack or Jill, what would you do to save the poor air-headed
ducks?

The Air-Head Experiment

Materials Needed:

A cup

2 liter soda bottle full of water (label removed).

A very small balloon.

A few washers that will fit around the opening of the balloon.

Permanent marker

Procedure:

Blow up the balloon (don't tie it) and draw a face on it with the marker.

After the ink is dry, deflate the balloon and put the washers on the opening.

Drop the balloon in a glass of water. Either add air or remove water from inside the balloon so that it just barely floats.

Covering the opening of the balloon, remove it from the cup and drop it in the 2 liter bottle. It should just barely float there too.

Put the cap tightly on the bottle.

Try to make the balloon go to the bottom of the bottle and then come back up again without moving the bottle or using magnets.

Hint: Air is compressible. If the air is squished, the
balloon will be more dense.

Try This: Put several 'air-heads' in the bottle so that
some just barely float and some sink. Place the bottle in the fridge and
see what happens!